We are looking at China from our political/economic frame of reference which is fundamentally American.
The reason that the US has targeted China militarily and economically is because it sees China as an existential threat to the US led world order and IMO the US is realistic enough (from its own rise in the 20th C) that the country with the biggest global GDP eventually will be the global hedgemon. The US has enjoyed that status since WW2 which saw the demise of the British Empire & Stirling as the global reserve currency.
Many on these threads emotively oppose China rather than trying to understand China and, IMO , that is because we fear China. By targeting China as our chief enemy potentially leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy.
How absurd is it to publicly declare China as our chief enemy when we are over 30% economically dependant on China? Just imagine that you are in business and you tell your major 30% customer that he is your enemy and that you will collude with others to destroy him? How would that work out...eh?
IMO our quiet defence against China ought to be: -Clear- up out our addiction to debt now running at nearly $1.8 Trillion. -diversify trade away from China by downstream processing our minerals so that we provide finished/semi-finished products to countries other than China, Japan & Korea. (eg motor vehicle industry -particularly EV industry- globally) -Put the hard word on the USA & the EC (the 2 biggest consumer markets) to offer us unfettered access to their markets (how silly is it to support EC countries in their opposition to the Russian invasion of the Ukraine when these same countries prohibit Aus exports via Trump-like trade tariffs!
If we can't beat China economically then we should copy it. China's move to economic fame was twofold: -Its acceptance into the WTO in 2000 -Its development of FTZs designed to overcome Chinese economic weaknesses and utilise Chinese Strengths
While Chinese weaknesses then were lack of capital & industrial/marketing expertise and its strengths were cheap labour and an industry friendly local and national governments ours currently are different.
Our weaknesses are Capital and supportive Governments, high labour costs/red tape and excessive taxation while our strengths are abundance of cheap natural resources including minerals & energy .
The purpose of SEZs are to: -counter our weaknesses -use/exploit our strengths -grow GDP for the benefit of all
If we don't like that ideologically then like Muslim countries , we'll regress into the 3rd world as our natural resources run out are become redundant.
Singapore , a country with little or no natural resources has shown us how SEZs can work even without our abundant resources EG: Singapore can import Crude Oil , refine it and then sell it to us at a profit !!! How good is that for Singapore? It also has a marketing hub for Aussie Iron Ore where it skims revenue from our IO exports to China and Asia without even sighting the ore!
So in summary , if we can "borrow from Singapore & China" a hybrid SEZ , then IMO , we can grow our GDP in double digits for decades , pay down our debts, self fund our defence needs and equitable share the balance....Its not rocket science... just common Aussie sense!
